Golfing Round the World
Chapter XVII Colwood and Jericho
If I left Honolulu with regret it was no mean compensation to carry away with me an ineffaceable picture of the island of Oahu as we steamed away on a perfect summer evening. Like a South Sea Arran it rose sheer from the sea, but instead of the steel blue and purple of the north, there was the deep rich southern colouring of brown and red and blue and emerald green. It was also fortunate to slip away from Hilo, the beautiful port of Hawaii as the sun was setting and see the massive mound of the twin volcano rise higher and higher out of the sea the further we receded from it.
We carried away with us some of the fragrance of Hawaii in the gorgeous tropical flowers which decorated the tables in the saloon.
A lady who happened to be a casual visitor to our bachelor table at dinner coined a phrase which deserves its niche in the temple of literature.
For some obscure reason she was irritated by the particular floral arrangement to which we were treated, so she damned the innocent and unoffending blooms
as 'garbage in a vase' vase rhyming with maze.
Tot Mulieres tot sententiae......
About this time I made the acquaintance of one of the engineers and under his expert guidance I descended to the depths of the "Imperatrice" and spent a fascinating hour or so among the turbines, pumps refrigerators and polished steel shafting. Whenever I go down the shaft tunnel on a big steamer, I am reminded of the fatal fact that small causes may have big effects.
One day a big ship was floated out of graving dock, where she had been undergoing repairs. A new tail shaft had been fitted. A few hours later the ship sank to the bottom of the Liverpool dock where she lay alongside. A feckless fitter day-dreaming in the security of dry dock had omitted to put in its place one bolt in a pedestal block which carried the shaft. As this block had to be bolted through to the outer skin of the ship, no sooner had she entered the water than she began to fill up through the empty bolt hole, till in a few hours she was completely submerged.
The engine room was delightfully cool and the stoke-hold very bearably hot in tropical waters, but near the Equator they registered one hundred and twenty nine degrees which I allow is too hot. I heard the other day of a stoke-hold temperature of one hundred and forty one in the Red Sea, a heat which cannot be tolerated by white men. No doubt oil fuel has tended to make the stoke-hold a cleaner and pleasanter place than it used to be, and so far as deck comfort is concerned it has improved ocean travel beyond comparison.
About midway between Hawaii and Vancouver we ran through the myriad fleet, easily the most numerous navy in the world known as 'Portuguese Men of War'. These are a species of black or very dark opaque or grey jelly fish which float in millions on the surface of the water. They appeared to be about three inches long by two inches broad, flat in shape, like the back of an oval nail brush and each carried a semi-circular fin or wing like membrane, which standing up at right angles to their flat bodies, functions exactly like a sail. They are rather like the little flat wooden ships one used to sail on in one's bath in the nursery age.
Why is it that west coasts are generally more attractive than eastern shores? Can it be that the land tends to slip or lag behind, in the daily race of this planet towards the east and so form mountains at its western edge. I decline to argue the question: but from such specimens as I have seen I strongly favour west coast of the American continent in preference to the East. The sea seems the proper place for the setting of the sun, and I do not care a hang where it rises, and obviously it can only sink properly in the west.
I had no disappointments or surprises so far as Vancouver Island or Victoria were concerned. One hears so much about them in England and pictures of the life and scenery are so familiar, that it is almost a shock to find things exactly as you expected.
There are the pine forests with giant trees, the rocky coast, the bold foothills and the towering snow clad peaks, the mighty rushing rivers, and the cool blue waters of the inlets. There is the very British looking Victoria B.C. save for the preponderance of wooden houses, and an air of arrested development as though it had not troubled to reach the twentieth century: but for sheer charm of situation and surroundings it would be very hard to beat.
Seeing that we only halted some ten hours at Victoria, I think it was not unenterprising to include a full round of golf at Colwood six miles away beyond the naval harbour of Esquinalt, but it was infinitely worth while and I would select Colwood as one of the finest golf courses in the world. In some respects it has the same character as St. Georges Hill near Weybridge, but it excels the Surrey course in possessing an absolutely perfect fairway, a lake, simply magnificent firs and pines, a cheerful open aspect and a certain proximity to the sea.
In Canada you are at home: and the welcome and hospitality as to a man and a brother, extended by the Canadian golfer is a thing to be proud of and grateful for. Indeed I have the profound conviction that British Columbia is more British than Britain.